Item Generation from Racks

Drop mechanics from a weapons or armor rack is apparently quite different than from other sources.

As I understand it, at MF=0, a Weapons or Armor Rack has about a 1-240 chance of dropping a unique, and about a 1 in 120 chance of dropping a set item. It always drops one item, and thus has a "no-drop chance"=0, and is unaffected by number of players or /pX.

The racklvl is defined to be equal to the area level. A list is generated of all the items that have qlvl<=racklvl, and if there are X number of items on that list, then each item has an equal chance, 1/X, of dropping. This is why racks tend to drop very low TC and very high TC items more often than monsters.

Given a rack in Hell Mausoleum, I'm assuming it takes on a level of 85, not 67 (which i remember as being the level of the Hell Mausoleum sparkly chest.)

Given that there are 10 "white" armor items at qlvl85 out of a total of 202 armor items, the odds are 10/202 or roughly 5% of dropping a qlvl85 normal item from a Mausoleum armor rack, assuming it drops a non-magic item. Thus,chances of this Hell Mausoleum rack dropping a diadem when it is dropping "whites" are 1/202.

Now lets consider a Griswold's Redemption Caduceus, which has a qlvl of 44 and which Hell Baal drops at odds of 1/47,391 at MF = 0 and /p1. Consider a weapons rack in an area with an alvl of 44 to 49. Once in 120 trials, on average, it will select Set quality. Now there are only 27 Set Weapons, and two of them -the Bul-Kathos twins - are Qlvl 50. So in an alvl =44-49, a weapons rack that has selected Set quality only has a list of 25 Set Weapons to select from. Thus a Griswold's Redemption would be selected 1/25 times, and total drop odds for a Griswold's redemption from a weapons rack at racklvl =44 to 49 would be =(1/120)*(1/25) =1/3,000 !

The same Griswold Redemption odds from a weapons rack in areas with alvl>49 would drop slightly to 1/3,240. And the odds of dropping either a Griswold's Redemption or one of the Bul-Kathos' swords from a high-level weapons rack would be 3/3,240 or 1/1080.

This seems too good to be true. Is there someone who can tell me what is wrong with my analysis?|||Base item is selected first, and they have their own qlvls. You cannot get a caduceus from a rack with that low an alvl, if you can at all.

Furthermore, the odds for unique is more like 1:1000 and the odds for set 1:125 (unless that changed from 1.07, which when I think about it, probably did, and probably for the worse).

So weapon racks don't go "I want to drop a set weapon, and then I choose from the list of set weapons available for my level", they go "I'm gonna drop a Pilum. Then I check if it should be unique. Naaah, I want to drop a set pilum. Oh damn, there IS no set pilum, so I'll just drop it as magic instead, and double the dura on it. Oh, right, no dura shown on throwing weapons. So it'll just look like an ordinary magic pilum."|||Quote:








Base item is selected first, and they have their own qlvls. You cannot get a caduceus from a rack with that low an alvl, if you can at all.

Furthermore, the odds for unique is more like 1:1000 and the odds for set 1:125 (unless that changed from 1.07, which when I think about it, probably did, and probably for the worse).




First the odds for drops of uniques have apparently improved from v1.07 where they were 1/1000 but are now 1/400 for most items and 1/240 for class-specific items. Odds for a rack selecting Set quality are 1/160 except for class-specific items which are 1/120. See this post: here.

So, given the sequence of decisions stated by Helvete, it seems to me that a rack could be an interesting source for certain items because their base items are chosen more frequently on a rack than they are chosen by the TC method (which is used for drops by monsters and all other objects.) Base items you will see more frequently on a rack include:

1. low level (TC3) items

2. Items with qlvls near the lvl of the rack

3. Wands, scepters and staves (which, in the TC method, drop at 1/3 the frequency of most other weapons )

4. Class-specific items (which, in the TC method, drop at 2/3 the frequency of most other items )

5. Armor items in general (Armor TCs are selected at about 1/2 the frequency of weapon TCs by the TC method.)

Does anyone know if Magic Find has an affect on Rack drops?

I am just trying to understand whether a rack is an unusually good source for any kind of a desireable item.

Comments?|||For me, a rack is a bit like a chest with a 100% chance for an armor or weapon, respectively. Taking efforts to reach a rack might pay off more than for a normal chest or basket because the latter often hold crap or nothing at all and they might need a key (which have all too often been used up on the previous chests). Maybe the chance for cracked gear is lower for racks than for chests. I actually noticed that chests produce a lot of cracked items. Was it always like that?

Racks don't use TCs IIRC, they use the base qlvl directly to determine which base items are available. It must be below the area level, and as there are no area levels beyond 85 (except e.g. Arreat Summit, but no monster can drop anything there), no items with a base qlvl of 85 and beyond can drop from a rack, i.e. nothing of "TC87". I'm not sure about the diestribution of the various base items, however. If it's linear (or closer to linear than monster drops), then racks are excellent for items with low or high basae qlvls (respectively TCs).

I might confuse racks with super-/sparkling chests here - it seems my D2 knowledge has reached my personal maximum, so each time I learn something new, I forget something else .|||Good analysis, I'll put a mention of racks in the draft TC3 guide thread.

My experience with racks is largely 1.07 related, but I wouldn't be surprised if the distribution of base items is linear. It certainly is more linear (at least, more spread out) that that of a typical monster drop in the same vicinity, which is why racks are good sources of low TC and high TC items.|||Remenmber, I'm recalling vague memories and I might have cionfgused racks with chests, so wait for those guys who love it to correct smartass mods like me |||so where do you find TC3 racks?|||I think the earliest place in which you can find racks is the Countess Tower.|||IIRC there's a possibility of racks in the Mausoleum and Crypt, which would be the earliest. Racks have "tendencies" towards dropping the same few base items with the same map seeds. Not as much in later versions as in 1.07, but it can still be very noticeable. I remember getting my first Harlequin Crest by doing a small detour while countess running, to a rack which would drop totemic masks and shakos on a pretty regular basis.

Something's changed with racks in 1.13, don't know what, but I have several times, with different characters gotten Exploding Potions from weapon racks. I cannot remember that ever happening in earlier versions, and I have played a LOT.|||Quote:








Something's changed with racks in 1.13, don't know what, but I have several times, with different characters gotten Exploding Potions from weapon racks. I cannot remember that ever happening in earlier versions, and I have played a LOT.




Lol no way. I've played 1.13 2x A LOT and that's never happened to me. Reinstall?